dan dan | Johnny Prime

My wife and I stopped in here last week for dinner now that they are open later. I was dying to try this “Shank JB Melt.”

It’s tender beef shank, cucumber, and Beecher’s cheese curds (melty and crisp) on a flaky pancake “crepe.” Kind of like an Asian take on a Philly cheesesteak. Look at how crisp yet melty that cheese is:

This was amazing. I highly recommend this for all you midtown east folks. Perfect lunch item.

We also tried the Mala Dan Dan Mixian noodles. This is a non-soup noodle dish that has a nice spicy and tingly flavor profile to it, with ground pork, peppercorn oil, pickled celery, mustard seeds, pickled mustard greens and peanuts. We also added a tea egg for $2 and it was well worth it.

For dessert we had the rose crystal jelly with black rock syrup, basil seeds, sesame and peanuts. A really light and refreshing way to end the meal.

I definitely recommend this place to everyone, especially those who like noodles. They have nice sandwich items at the midtown location that really shine too.

LITTLE TONG NOODLE SHOP
235 E 53rd St
New York, NY 10022

My wife and I stopped by “Handy Nasty” for a quick bite before a concert at Webster Hall. I’d heard good things about this place, so was eager to try it out.

We started with an order of pork belly with chili oil. This was served cold. The texture of the fat on each slice was noodle-like, and the meat was likely boiled and then sliced thin. It had good flavor, and I suppose all that oil is meant to be mixed into the big bowl of rice that comes with it. Honestly we could have been full just from that alone. Portion sizes are massive here.

We also tried the dry pepper chicken wings. These were a little greasy from the puffed up batter on the wings, but the addition of chili paste, fried ginger, fried garlic and dry peppers give it a great flavor. The meat itself was very juicy.

My wife had the dan dan noodles. The mildly spicy peanut sauce is mixed into the noodles table-side for this massive portion of starch.

I went with an old stand-by: chicken lo mein. I figured I would test the mettle of this joint by ordering something so insanely common just to see how they executed. It was great – probably close to my favorite of the night, right alongside the pork belly. Quality ingredients and correct proportions of each, along with a hit of spice and low grease content, all make this a winner: